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COMMENTARY: Is Trump about to poke Quebec’s political beehive?

When was the last time that a U.S. president seriously stirred the hornet’s nest of Quebec politics?

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My best recollection is former U.S. president Bill Clinton. During the 1994 Quebec referendum campaign, Clinton made clear that the U.S. wholly endorsed a united and strong federal Canada – as opposed to a dismembered one. He went on to add that an independent Quebec would have no guarantee of joining the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) as a full-fledged member.

Today, we see U.S. President Donald Trump inserting himself – unwittingly or wittingly – into the electoral and sovereignty politics of Quebec. It’s pretty clear that the resurgent Coalition Avenir Québec (CAQ) government is trying to make the October 5th provincial election about anything other than its own governmental record and more about Trump’s economic coercion against Canada. Of course, the Parti Québécois (PQ), the odds-on-favourite, wants to make the electoral contest a referendum on the CAQ and its party leader, Christine Fréchette.

But what if Trump really wanted to make his presence felt in Quebec’s political life? How much influence could he have on shaping political outcomes in Quebec? How much of an “X factor” could he be?

The PQ has even........

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